Allison Holker’s 16-year-old daughter, Weslie Renae, is now sharing her thoughts on the immense backlash her mom has faced over the last week. Following comments Holker made about her late husband, Stephen ‘tWitch’ Boss, and the announcement of her memoir, his family has spoken out against her, said book and the attention all of this has been getting, while also bringing up other issues. Now, Holker’s daughter has posted a long video defending her mom, and she addressed hot-button topics surrounding all of this – like the reported use of NDAs at Boss’s funeral.
Noting how complex this situation is, Weslie explained in a 34-minute Instagram video that she was having trouble figuring out how to say what she wanted to say. She began by candidly addressing her relationship with Boss, noting that while he wasn’t her biological dad, “Stephen was the person that raised me.”
She also addressed tWitch’s family and her relationship with them amid the wave of thoughts they’ve shared about his death and how it’s been discussed as of late. Holker’s daughter said:
I’m still trying to be respectful to everybody. I’m just so over, for instance, his family, everyone’s headlining right now — and these are big players into my life and big players into my siblings’ life and my mom’s life. Literally, like, these are all people I’ve grown up with. And to see them now act different for social media it’s like, I don’t know. I’m trying to be respectful but I just think it’s complicated because I speak to Stephen’s mom, like my mom and her were speaking weekly at some point.
For context, following the announcement of Holker’s book, This Far: My Story of Love, Loss, and Embracing the Light, which is about her life before and after losing tWitch and dealing with grief, members of Boss’ family have spoken out. His cousin, a DJ named Darielle, posted that “you did our family so mf dirty,” while talking about the NDAs used at his funeral. Holker was also called out by her husband’s friend, Courtney Ann Platt, and his brother, Dré Rose, reposted it, via NY Post. Later on, Boss’ mom slammed the “misleading and hurtful claims” that have come out. She didn’t specifically name Holker, though she did make it very clear that she was upset about the media coverage surrounding her son over the past week.
Later on in the video, Weslie claimed that her mom has made an active effort to keep her kids connected to Boss’s family.
To that point, she said that she’s seen Boss’ relatives more after his death than before, because the families live in two different states. She also claimed that it’s her mom making the effort to make sure she and her siblings stay connected to her late husband’s side of their family. Weslie did say, however, that she feels “disrespected” by them and doesn’t talk to them, saying:
They’ve gone on social media saying that ‘Blood’s thicker than whatever,’ and that’s a direct dig at me and my mom. If you don’t see me as Stephen’s daughter, that’s cool, take it how you want. I know for a fact that’s never how he saw it, and it’s literally just hurtful.
As Weslie continued to make her point, she said that she’s “slowly started to remove” herself from communication with tWitch’s family – naming his brothers and mom. However, along with that, she claimed that the narrative that her mom is making it so they can’t see her late husband’s family is a lie, noting, again, that she’s seen them more after his death than before.
As I mentioned, the NDAs have been a big point of conversation. Weslie also addressed them in her video, explaining why they had them with the following words:
But, in one day, we had an open casket, like, viewing for Stephen, we had a funeral, and then we had a wake. And my mom asked for NDAs to be signed when we were seeing Stephen’s body, because God forbid somebody that went to that took a photo of Stephen and put it on the internet or shared it with somebody else. That’s the type of things that NDAs are for. It’s not so you can never talk about Stephen.
She went on to say that she was “fed up, because NDAs are so important,” and noted that she’s “grateful” that her mom used them. Also, she claimed that even though there were NDAs, her mom was “lenient” with them and did not make everyone sign them. Continuing to speak about the funeral, Holker’s daughter said the anger surrounding all of this made the day really hard:
That whole day was supposed to be beautiful, and instead, it was less than that. We were gonna say our goodbyes, and instead, people were yelling at each other and bashing my mom and, that’s a day that’s taken away from her, and she can’t remember it as being the day that we all wanted to be because his family was making it otherwise.
Explaining that her mom has tried to keep things respectful, Weslie said that this feels like “two years of pent-up stuff,” she also said she thought the drama surrounding the NDA situation was “unnecessary.”
Toward the end of the video, she spoke about the hurt she’s felt from seeing people who are family and friends of the dancer saying things about his death and her mom. She said that they have “burned bridges,” and she made it clear that she does not want to communicate with people who are spreading these kinds of messages.
Overall, the claims surrounding Holker, Boss and his legacy are complex, and new allegations continue to surface. As this situation evolves, we’ll be sure to keep you posted.